This piece will be running this week as a newspaper op/ed in my very red congressional district (VA-06).
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Just Say No to Obstructionism
Perceptive political observers seem unanimous about what’s coming:
The Biden administration will be sending proposals to Congress, and the Republicans in the Senate will do all they can to block him across the board. I.e., they’ll try do to Biden what they succeeded in doing to Obama: close off the possibility of enacting legislation, in order to make his presidency a failure.
But it could hardly be clearer that such Republican obstructionism would hurt virtually every American.
The United States now faces multiple crises – the pandemic, a wave of economic extinctions hitting countless small businesses, families insecure about food and housing, toxic political winds blowing, climate change, etc.
At such times of crises, the nation’s need for effective government is especially intense. And at such times, government paralysis – which is the result of obstructionism -- is the last thing we want: Obstructionism would condemn the nation to drift in dangerous waters, when what we need is well-chosen navigation.
It is a betrayal of the nation at any time for a political party to choose to paralyze the government. But especially at a time of intense challenges like those we face now.
Not only would making the President “fail” mean inflicting unnecessary suffering on the American people. But also the failure to take well-designed action also means squandering the opportunity the crisis presents to make real improvements on how our nation is set up.
In the same way that the Great Depression opened the way for important improvements like the creation of the Social Security program, so also is this crisis an opportunity to – as the Biden team has put it – “Build Back Better.”
So what the American people need now is for all of those in power to use the system as our founders would have hoped: with each branch of government respecting the proper roles of the other branches, and with all dedicated to the purpose of achieving the best possible outcome for the well-being of the people and the good of the nation.
Traditionally, the role of the President in the American system, in times of crisis, has included providing leadership in times of crisis. That has been true in past crises (like the Depression and World War II). So should it be now.
Despite all the lies that have been told about non-existent voter fraud, the repeatedly established truth – which all Americans should accept – is that in a free and fair election, “the will of the people” has chosen Joe Biden to play the presidential role.
Obstructionism, therefore, not only injures the nation. Its attempt to nullify “the will of the people” is thoroughly un-American.
But there’s more. Not only is Biden legitimately our President, and not only is he inescapably the only President we’ve got, but he’s lately shown some qualities of leadership that should encourage Americans to expect to benefit from Biden’s succeeding in leading the nation.
We should be encouraged, for example, by the unusually high-powered team Biden has been choosing. (Many of the people he’s named would be contenders for an All-Star team selected by people whose main goal is getting what’s best for the nation.)
That suggests that serving his own ego is not Biden’s purpose. Among those who seek the presidency, excessive egotism is always a danger. And in our history we’ve had some Presidents who prefer “small” people around them to make themselves look larger. But Biden is surrounding himself with people more brilliant and more knowledgeable than he.
Biden seems happy to lead by getting the nation the best he can find.
Which leads to the second point: the fact that Biden’s A-Team seems outstanding -- both in terms of their capability and their proven spirit of public service – gives promise that the proposals sent to Congress by the Biden team are more than usually likely to be excellent.
And if those proposals are excellent – if their enactment would actually help improve both our immediate situation and the American future – then it would be especially egregious for the Republicans in the Senate to automatically block their enactment. No decent political party would squander the opportunity to benefit Americans just to get partisan political advantage.
So Americans -- knowing that obstructionism would be injurious to themselves and disastrous for America -- should make it clear that obstructionism is unacceptable.
One way of combatting obstructionism is available to the voters of Georgia: it is in their power to strip Mitch McConnell of his control of the Senate—control he’s universally expected to use to prevent good proposals from even being considered.
But if the Republicans maintain control of the Senate, those voters in the Republican base should demand that their Senators work with the President to enact the best possible measures for helping the nation emerge in good shape from this crisis.